


First Holidays

by thecryoftheseagulls



Series: Zeryn Brosca [10]
Category: Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: F/M, Holidays, Mistletoe, Multi, Satinalia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-04
Updated: 2015-07-27
Packaged: 2018-03-05 06:49:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,791
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3110099
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thecryoftheseagulls/pseuds/thecryoftheseagulls
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A glimpse into the first couple of Satinalias that Zeryn Brosca experiences. A quickie drabble I wrote on Christmas Eve.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Technically, the first Satinalia Alistair and Zeryn Brosca spend together is a frigid night while a Blight ravages the land and Loghain’s hunters seem to be behind every tree. It is a simple affair – she, Oghren, and Sten are excessively puzzled by this human holiday, and the date would have passed them by unknowing had it not been for Alistair and Leliana. Mostly, they camp under the stars, but Fereldan winters are cold, and Wynne makes sure that the eve of Satinalia is spent, for once, in an inn. Their little band spreads out around the fire in a warm hall and drinks far more ale than is perhaps advised with a war on. The humans talk about the holidays they have known before so that the others can get a feeling for what the day is all about. Alistair talks about evening mass in the Chantry, the special hymns which are only sung once a year. For all his impiety, there is a softness around his eyes when he says the songs felt like home in a small way, on that day of merriment when even the other children were too busy celebrating to notice him much or call him bastard. Wynne talks about the small gifts the apprentices shared with each other in the Circle. In Orlais, Leliana says, the streets are festooned with garlands of pine and whatever fashion is in season gives way to the copious greens and reds which make up every noble’s wardrobe during the celebration. Zeryn is still not completely certain she understands the allure of the holiday – celebrating the height of winter because the sun will return more and more in the following days is a foreign idea for someone raised in halls lit eternally by the blood of the stone. Still, as surfacers, they are bound to the change of the seasons, and Zeryn loves the sky so much that she can see how traditions would spring up around the travels of the sun.

The innkeeper hangs a small sprig of mistletoe above the entrance to the stairs. When Zeryn goes to make her way to bed, Zevran stops just on the first stair to make conversation so that she is still standing under the arch when Alistair comes up beside her.

“Ah-ah, my dear Wardens, that is mistletoe above your heads, no?” Zevran’s eyes twinkle when Alistair, equally oblivious, goes to pass the pair of them. Alistair looks up and groans.

“Maker’s breath, Zevran, you did that on purpose!” He whines.

Zevran assumes a mock-serious expression and says somberly, “Maybe I just like to see you squirm, my friend.”

At a loss, Zeryn looks between her friends. “Someone care to clue in the dwarf as to what’s going on here?” She looks up at the small bit of greenery. “Misl-whatcha-ma-ding-it?”

Behind them, Morrigan says, “It is, as I understand it, tradition at this time of year to hang mistletoe from tall places to catch unsuspecting passersby. Any two people caught underneath at the same time must exchange a kiss.”

Zeryn peers up at the mistletoe once more, her green eyes lighting up. “Oooh, kinky,” she says. “You lot are more creative than I give you credit for.”

At her side, Alistair has flushed wine-red. He scrubs a hand over his face as Zevran practically cackles.

“You, er, sure about this, Zeryn? I mean, what about our audience? It’s just a silly tradition. We really don’t have to…” Alistair looks down at her in mortification, stuttering. At his words, there is a small wrench in Zeryn’s chest, like a knife tip plunged under her skin and twisted just so. Does he really not want to kiss her? They’ve kissed before, haven’t they? Why not now?

“Oh yes, you really do,” Zevran counters, interrupting the doubts scattering Zeryn’s thoughts, and she looks up to find them hemmed in on both sides by curious onlookers. She swallows, and turns to say to Alistair in an undertone,

“If you don’t want to kiss me, you don’t have to. I’m a dwarf, so human traditions don’t have to apply to me,” she says, willing her voice to be steady, the wink she gives him co-conspiratorial.

He frowns immediately, a crease between his brows, and seems to forget his embarrassment. “That’s not what I…what I meant to say is…oh, sod it.” Then his big hand is at her back, another cupping the back of her head, and he tips her backwards without warning. She’s sure she would fall over without the pressure of his hands holding her up, and silly man, he’s practically standing on his head with how far he has to bend over her to tip her back like this. Her head feels light and airy, and then his chapped lips are over hers, firm and warm and just a little bit wet. She forgets the shock and the weakness in her limbs, forgets to breathe, really. Damn the Blight and Loghain and Arl Eamon, damn the cold and the strangeness of surfacer habits, but she does love this man, and nothing in her life has ever really made sense except the way she falls into his warm eyes like she finally knows what home is.

***

Their second Satinalia together, home has a physical location, at least for now. Vigil’s Keep is showered with gifts from the surrounding countryfolk, especially those in Amaranthine who survived the darkspawn attack largely because of Zeryn’s aid. The Keep smells perpetually like cookies, and there’s this particular warm cider the cook makes that Zeryn adores (and, admittedly, adores more once Oghren has had his way with it). Anders makes everyone misshapen but warm sweaters which they take to wearing around the drafty old rooms. One of the mousers has a litter of kittens two weeks before Satinalia which delights everyone to no end (even Velanna), and Anders insists that Pounce is the father as several of the kittens take after him. Zeryn’s mabari Cailan seems to make it his personal mission to stand watch over the tiny creatures, intervening whenever anyone pets a kitten for what he deems to be too long and taking the small animal back to its mother.

Alistair sends to Rica for some of the eye shadow of that particular shade of purple that Zeryn always wears, surprising her with it. No one seems to mind over much that Zeryn forgets about the gift-giving part of the holiday.

That year, it is not Alistair and Zeryn who get caught together under the mistletoe, but Zeryn and Sigrun. Theirs has been a slow dance - shared memories of Dust Town, reading practice over dirty novels which make Sigrun blush and Anders crow, the quiet pleasure of tending to their weapons and armor before the fire after a long day. Alistair knows the camaraderie between the two dwarves is something unique, something precious, and any jealousy there once was fades when he sees how they are together. The smile Zeryn wears around Sigrun is the same she wears when he’s alone with her, tender, vulnerable, even slightly afraid. He thinks he might love Sigrun just because she brings that smile to Zeryn’s face. Well, and she has the most striking eyes behind those tattoos, of course. And Maker, if she isn’t particularly lethal with those twin blades of hers.

Well. The two dusters are the unfortunate ones under the mistletoe, and of course Zeryn laughs loudly and invites the kiss with a lewd smirk while Sigrun looks like she wants to disappear into the floorboards. Alistair can see Zeryn’s hesitance under her apparent confidence in the tense set of her shoulders. When she looks at him, uncertain, he smiles and nods, and then Sigrun says something he doesn’t quite catch and Zeryn locks their lips together in much more than a casual kiss. They break apart both a bit out of breath and glassy-eyed. Zeryn grasps at the other dwarf’s shoulder once more and then sashays her way to Alistair’s side, but Alistair is the one who catches the way Sigrun bites her lip and trails her eyes after his lover wistfully. When their eyes meet over Zeryn’s shoulder, it’s hunger he feels in the pit of his stomach instead of unhappiness, and the emotion thrills him and scares him all at once.

That Satinalia marks the first night Sigrun joins Alistair and Zeryn in their bed.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I wrote a short drabble for tumblr that just follows the one previous, so I thought I would add it here. Eventually I will write more for these 3, I promise!

Zeryn’s looking at Sigrun with stars in her eyes, stars Alistair knows all too well, and he can’t help the grin that starts forming. 

Sigrun, for her part, looks like a startled deer, glancing between Alistair and Zeryn quickly, her blue eyes wide. 

“Uh…give me a hand, here, Constable,” Sigrun says, turning her blue eyes appealingly at him. 

He just chuckles.

“I’ve gotta say, I’m with Zeryn on this one.” Sigrun stares at him, looking like she’s discovered another naughty book whose cover she just can’t quite puzzle out. Then Anders sneaks up behind the duster and winks at him. Alistair casts a frown at the mage, confused, but he doesn’t have time to figure it out before he’s shoved forcibly from behind by Zeryn, and Sigrun is shove forcibly from behind by Anders. She stumbles into him, and he catches her against his chest on instinct, and then they’re pressed together. Very close. Right underneath the mistletoe Zeryn and Sigrun were just underneath. 

“You have got to be shitting me,” Sigrun groans, trying to step back, but Alistair is onto the game now, and he catches her fingers with his larger hands and pulls her back. 

“It is tradition, after all,” he says beguilingly, and Sigrun scowls up at him. “Please?” He does his best imitation of the look Zeryn calls his puppy eyes, and over Sigrun’s head, can see Zeryn beaming and giving him a thumbs up in the background. 

Sigrun still looks suspicious, but she relents. 

“I mean,” she catches her bottom lip between her teeth, “if you want...”

“I very much want,” Alistair says, sincerely, forgetting their audience for a moment as Sigrun gives him an uncertain expression and very, very slowly softens and smiles at him. 

He doesn’t need much more invitation than that to let go her hand and cup her cheek and kiss her. Or, more accurately, bend nearly in half to bend her backwards and kiss her thoroughly. 

Zeryn cheers and Sigrun is breathless and red-cheeked under her tattoos when he straightens and lets her back up. They stare at each other for a moment, until Zeryn bustles forward and grabs Alistair’s hand with one hand and Sigrun’s with her other. 

“Yep, okay, night Anders,” Zeryn calls over her shoulder, dragging them both behind her towards the Warden Commander’s room.

**Author's Note:**

> As ever, I'm also on tumblr as thecryoftheseagulls.


End file.
